Losing My Feminist Cred
I may be losing mine, because I think this is hilarious. I'm absolutely there on the I am NOT calling my cooch a "betty" front, and the ad copy is revolting, but the existance of a technicolor pubic hair dye is fucking hilarious. Also? If this means a resexualizaton of The Hair Down There, I'm all for it, because the expectation of a clean shave skeeves me out to no end. Dude, I'm not eleven anymore, and anyone with privileges ought to be glad of that.
On the Good Feminist front, I'll have to throw you over to Robin, who writes an open letter to NBC regarding Heroes that echoes my comments upon seeing the attempted rape of yet another female character. It's old. It's been done. In the middle of a highly creative mindfuck of a show, its a breath of stale air. It's not powerful; it's a cliché. I heard the collective eyeroll of a gazillion viewers saying "of COURSE the cheerleader almost gets raped by the quarterback while they're drinking at a bonfire. I've seen this After School Special before!"
And, you know, there's a powerful feminist critique there, as well, but like I've said, Robin's got that covered, and I'm apparently off my feminist game this week.
Karen Healey? Gots massive game. She takes on some of my least favorite arguments against feminist critique of mass culture (in this case comics, but you saw that coming), including the "you're not changing anything with your critique" argument (NB one might extend the observer effect/Hawthorne effect argument to suggest that public criticism reflects to its subjects the existance of an observer, and thus necessarily creates change, however small. That's just my take on things, though. Go read what Healey has to say).She also takes on the inherent misandry in "boys will be boys" arguments, which makes me wanna shout Amen from a very high, echoing location. She writes:
Feminism in my life has always seemed more about caring that everyone be free from gender-based social constraints, and Healey really hits that button on my feminist fangirl console.
On the Good Feminist front, I'll have to throw you over to Robin, who writes an open letter to NBC regarding Heroes that echoes my comments upon seeing the attempted rape of yet another female character. It's old. It's been done. In the middle of a highly creative mindfuck of a show, its a breath of stale air. It's not powerful; it's a cliché. I heard the collective eyeroll of a gazillion viewers saying "of COURSE the cheerleader almost gets raped by the quarterback while they're drinking at a bonfire. I've seen this After School Special before!"
And, you know, there's a powerful feminist critique there, as well, but like I've said, Robin's got that covered, and I'm apparently off my feminist game this week.
Karen Healey? Gots massive game. She takes on some of my least favorite arguments against feminist critique of mass culture (in this case comics, but you saw that coming), including the "you're not changing anything with your critique" argument (NB one might extend the observer effect/Hawthorne effect argument to suggest that public criticism reflects to its subjects the existance of an observer, and thus necessarily creates change, however small. That's just my take on things, though. Go read what Healey has to say).She also takes on the inherent misandry in "boys will be boys" arguments, which makes me wanna shout Amen from a very high, echoing location. She writes:
We are not our bodies. That’s, in fact, the essential argument of feminism – that the female body is not the only thing a woman is, that she is also and more importantly an actual person... This argument is also misandrist, as it plays the “Oh, teehee, those boys, they can’t help that they think only with their dicks” card. Did you hear that, men? You are also no more than your bodies!
Feminism in my life has always seemed more about caring that everyone be free from gender-based social constraints, and Healey really hits that button on my feminist fangirl console.
posted by Turtle at 10:41 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home